Premier Alison Redford is almost set to unveil her first major cabinet shuffle since winning the 2012 election, according to government sources. It’s expected to bring a big switch in jobs and faces — and government direction.

Some ministers will be dropped from cabinet. A few select backbenchers will move up. Several current ministers will be changing offices, although some of the core group — such as Finance Minister Doug Horner — will apparently stay where they are.

As Redford met with her caucus in Edmonton on Thursday, just after the legislative session shut down until next spring, ministers and winning backbenchers still hadn’t received their phone calls from the premier.

The full list is still described as “fluid.” There’s a chance the shuffle could come as early as Friday, but it’s more likely to happen next week.

It’s said that a key goal is to better prepare Alberta for what comes next in the economy, as well as what happens now. There will be a heavy focus on innovation.

Although the size of cabinet isn’t settled yet, it might grow by a job or two, raising the total number of ministers, including Redford, to 19 or 20.

Redford wants to set a clear government direction as the Progressive Conservatives head toward the second half of their mandate, and the long run-up to the 2016 election.

By acting now, she gives new ministers plenty of time to get their seats warm before they have to face the opposition.

Both the extent of the shuffle and the altered focus raise the obvious question: who’s in and who’s out?

One safe predication is Diana McQueen will leave the environment job for what’s described as a promotion.

The fate of deputy premier Thomas Lukaszuk will be interesting. He’s in charge of both innovation and post-secondary education — the heart of Redford’s new focus — but his funding follies this year have made the government few friends in the universities.

Lukaszuk finally seems to realize that being deputy premier doesn’t give him his own power base. But it’s no longer clear Redford even feels she needs a deputy at all, and especially not this one. He will stay in cabinet, however.

Another big question is what happens to Health Minister Fred Horne. Like every politician who spends more than a year in this brutal job, he looks exhausted and increasingly frustrated.

Horne is associated with the firing of the entire board of Alberta Health Services and the gathering of all power into his department.

The whole endeavour — as well as the homecare fiasco, nursing home scandals and much else — has been a steady engine of ugly publicity.

Like Gene Zwozdesky before him, Horne may suffer from being linked to too much bad news, not all of it his fault.

In Human Services, Dave Hancock presided over the spring fiasco in the care for the developmentally disabled. The Calgary Herald-Edmonton Journal series on the deaths of children in care, and his shifting responses, didn’t help him at all.

But he is a key Redford loyalist and adviser. Hancock hasn’t been out of a cabinet job through five elections and isn’t likely to start now.

Who might move up? Calgary-Varsity MLA Donna Kennedy-Glans is perhaps the most overqualified non-minister in Redford’s caucus. If the premier is inclined to move Ken Hughes out of the energy job, she would be a solid replacement.

New Tourism Minister Richard Starke has also been impressive. Sandra Jansen, associate minister of Family and Community Safety, could get an expanded role.

Transportation Minister Ric McIver has proven himself a better provincial politician than he was a Calgary council member. He had much to do with the Tsuu T’ina ring road deal, one of Redford’s greatest triumphs.

And the premier has to decide whether to shuffle two of her talented young ministers, Jeff Johnson in Education and Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths.

She was still working on the choices Thursday. They’re coming soon.

Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald

dbraid@calgaryherald.com

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